Robin Wauters

Siemens IT Solutions and Services has concluded a new partnership agreement with VMware to deliver innovative virtualization solutions to the marketplace. The agreement between Siemens IT Solutions and Services and VMware includes developing new offers and implementing a common marketing and sales strategy, and will allow joint customer acquisition.

VMware was a key partner with Siemens in its largest virtualization transformation and project yet completed. Siemens utilized VMware virtualization technology to help transform the Siemens global IT presence into a fully dynamic environment. Through that effort, the two companies have forged very close ties and continue to engage in ongoing product development and testing for their customers.

Also through that effort, Siemens has been able to:

• Consolidate 11 compute locations into 2
• Virtualize 10,948 servers and 9,600 applications
• Standardize on storage utility, application assessment, integrated lifecycle services and standard services catalog

In doing so, they were able to achieve cost-savings and process efficiencies such as:

• 17:1 Server Compute reduction
• 30% Power and cooling reduction across sample environments
• 45% Floor space reduction through consolidation and virtualization
• Management and administrative cost reductions of 25% – 35%
• Accommodation of application lifecycle and disaster recovery services

Siemens and VMware are maximizing their strengths in the management of IT infrastructures and the provisioning of virtualization solutions to deliver more robust product and service offerings to current and future customers. In addition to the Siemens AG transformation, the two companies have already successfully implemented virtualization solutions for several high-profile companies. With those successes, the two companies are looking to drive expansion of their customer base through this partnership.

Project Golden Ratio (inspiration) is a new project – PDF – within the Xen.org community to determine a set of metrics that allow the community to measure and evaluate itself.

These set of metrics will allow the community to find areas of strength and weakness in an overall effort to improve community participation, growth, and success. As with all things open source, Project Golden Ratio will be developed in the public space and is open to contribution from all interested parties.

The following community activities will be measured:

• Xen.org Products – software, testing, support, documentation, mailing lists
• Xen.org Website – traffic measurements
• Community Activity – promotion, events, user groups, evangelists
• Social Networks – 3^rd party networking sites (e.g. Facebook, LinkedIn)

Syncsort, maker of  high-performance data processing, data integration and data protection and recovery software, has announced a new professional services offering for organizations who are planning to deploy server virtualization.

Syncsort’s MVP (Migration, Verification and Protection) service is performed by technical specialists who help plan, manage, verify and rapidly deploy minimally-disruptive physical to virtual migration of data, applications and servers. This critical offering is expected to become a routine requirement to provide customers with the flexibility to rapidly and securely migrate their server environments.

The MVP service delivers:

• Safe and rapid P2V and V2V migration of critical applications and servers
• Data protection and availability throughout the migration process with minimal impact to the environment
• Multiple migration checkpoints for live testing with safe fallback to a physical server
• Monitoring of both physical and virtual environment
• Full protection in the post-migration period

The MVP service will be distributed and delivered by reseller partners of Syncsort, Inc. These IT professionals will utilize Syncsort’s best practices P2V migration solutions with Syncsort BEX data protection software, and they will be formally trained and fully authorized by experienced Syncsort engineers. Resellers of the MVP service will be able to create greater value to their customers and more opportunities for their businesses.

This program is part of Syncsort’s broader commitment to improving data centers through the combination of technology, service innovations and distribution channels. The MVP service supports users migrating to VMware and Microsoft Hyper-V environments.

Server Technology, announces the release of a series of application notes created to help design engineers, application engineers and data center managers power Cisco’s Unified Computing System (UCS).

These application notes illustrate how to power and provide redundancy for Cisco UCS 5108 Blade Server Chassis and 6120XP 20-Port Fabric Interconnects in multiple configurations using Smart Cabinet Power Distribution Units (PDUs) from Server Technology, Inc. Models CS-18VY, CS-24V2, CS-12HD2, and CS-24V5.

The application notes are posted on the Server Technology Web site at www.servertech.com/cisco. Application Notes APN-100-012 through APN-100-021 include detailed wiring diagrams, power requirements for Cisco Unified Computing System and recommendations on power in-feeds from 208 V 30A, Three Phase 208 V 60A and Three Phase 415V 30A power solutions.

Key Benefits Include:

• Sentry Smart 3-Phase PDUs reduce the number of PDUs needed to deliver the power required by this cabinet configuration. This in turn reduces the number of power drops required for each cabinet.
• Fewer power cords means lower infrastructure costs, less poles taken up at the breaker panel and improved airflow in a raised floor environment, resulting in improved cooling in the cabinet.
• Sentry Smart PDUs allow administrators to view the current load and environmental conditions remotely.
• SNMP traps and email alerts ensure notification if a problem has occurred along with logging of all actions performed by the user.
• Local LEDs Per Branch Circuit or Phase- Large, easy-to-read displays let you determine if the load is balanced and provide visual indication that power is supplied to the PDU.
• Environmental measurements- Quantity (2) temperature and (2) humidity measurements are provided per pair of PDUs.
• Local and remote notification if a branch circuit is lost.
• Master and Link configuration (CS/CL) allows two power in-feeds and all environmental information to be monitored via a single IP address per cabinet.

The Cisco Unified Computing System is a next-generation data center platform that unites compute, network, storage access, and virtualization into a cohesive system designed to reduce total cost of ownership (TCO) and increase business agility.

F5 Networks today announced a new F5 Management Pack solution for Microsoft System Center Operations Manager that allows joint F5 and Microsoft customers to dynamically manage application delivery in virtual environments.

F5 also updated its Application Ready Solution portfolio to support Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2008 R2 Hyper-V, and System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 R2.

The F5 solutions announced today offer optimization and increased availability for virtual environments, enabling IT staff to make better decisions regarding applications running in the virtual environment, and automating virtual machine management.

F5 has added Performance and Resource Optimization (PRO) capabilities to the F5 Management Pack, introduced in April 2009. The PRO-enabled Management Pack, in combination with Microsoft System Center Operations Manager and System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 R2, provides customers with enhanced visibility into both the application delivery network and the server environment, enabling IT teams to proactively monitor and dynamically manage application delivery as network or user conditions change. In addition, the F5 Management Pack now proactively offers tips to improve application delivery.

This announcement comes as part of a series of updates for the existing suite of F5 Application Ready Solutions for Microsoft Windows Server, including solutions for IIS, Remote Desktop Services (RDS), Hyper-V, and System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 R2. Leveraging the Live Migration feature of Hyper-V, F5 solutions also include configuration guidance to perform the network-level changes required to move virtual machines between hosts without taking them offline.

VMLogix today announced that VMLogix LabManager will support Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization.

This combined solution will offer enterprise-class virtual lab automation solution for Linux environments.

This new partnership aims to allow customers to consolidate labs leveraging the KVM platform integrated into Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 and Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization, and allows for the use VMLogix LabManager to automate lab IT infrastructure in order to deliver and maintain software applications more quickly, cost-effectively and reliably. Software development, test and support teams can dramatically reduce the manual effort, time and IT resources required to develop and maintain higher quality software applications by using comprehensive automation capabilities, advanced team management and seamless integrations with leading development tools.

Support for Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization for VMLogix LabManager will be generally available in Q4 2009.